2011-01-30

中国在社交网络上审查“埃及 "Egypt" blocked on twitter-like sites in China

It was difficult to see how the situations in Egypt and in Tunisia could inspire would be protesters in China. With an economy in constant expansion and some hope of a better life, one would have thought that Chinese leaders should rest easy.

However, reports are coming in that the word "Egypt" 埃及 is being blocked from all micro-blogging services in China. This is being reported from several western and Arabic media outlets.
The Chinese government might not have thought this through. Blocking the word is a sure way of rousing interest in the subject and the Tunisian method. Clearly Hu Jintao talk of Human Rights with Obama was misunderstood.
Update: PC World reports that, for the moment, the English word "Egypt" is not blocked but its Chinese language version is censored.